the human intelligence asset was run by this fbi agent. the connection to bin laden only came to light after he filed a discrimination suit against the bowero and his supervisor testified about the quality of his work and the assets he was running, quote, it was the only source i know in the bureau where we had a source in al qaeda directly involved. it's a very small group, but this person was already here. he was also connected to the blind sheik serving a life prison sentence for the hack in 1993. the information helped the fbi disrupt a terrorism plot against a los angeles messianic lodge in the '90s. neither lee hamilton who chaired the 9/11 commission, nor the executive director could remember be told about the fbi asset. a former head of the house intelligence committee said they were in the dark, too. >> this is the first time that anybody really did a deep dive into al qaeda. what were their capabilities, their plans, and why did we walk away from bin laden or his organization some time in the '90s when we were that close? >> in a